A
new Collaborative Training Partnership (CTP), led by Procter & Gamble and
including Northumbria University, has received funding as part of a £22.5m
investment from the Biotechnology and Biological Sciences Research Council
(BBSRC) to address skill gaps in the UK bioscience industry.
The
P&G-led Bioscience for Sustainable Consumer Products (BISCOP) CTP will
create an inclusive, collaborative environment for high quality doctoral
training that will prepare over 30 PhD students – around a third of which will
be based at Northumbria - with the knowledge and skills needed for successful
careers at the forefront of global bioscience. This will help ensure the UK
maintains a leadership position in bioscience with improved translation of
frontier research into economic and societal impact.
The
BISCOP partnership spans Procter & Gamble Technical Centres Limited,
Prozomix Limited, Northumbria University, Newcastle University and Durham
University, and will build on long-standing close partnerships in the region to
generate more capacity into the bioscience skills base in the North East of
England.
Professor
of Protein Biochemistry and BISCOP programme lead for Northumbria University,
Gary Black, said: “This BBSRC Collaborative Training Partnership will allow
Northumbria University, to further develop our long-standing relationship with
regional partners Procter & Gamble and Prozomix around enzyme discovery, development,
production and characterisation and, importantly, will allow us to initiate new
interactions involving probiotics, carbon capture and waste valorisation
research, to name just a few.
“The
next generation of bioscientists trained through this programme will play a
vital role in our action on climate change by helping to create more
sustainable consumer products.”
Developing
the next generation of sector leaders
The
program will leverage the unique partner capabilities to deliver cohort
training that will develop future sector leaders with the transferable skills
and experiences required for success in the emerging research environment. It
will focus on six BBSRC research topics of Industrial Biotechnology, Synthetic
Biology, Structural Biology, Microbiology, Technology Development, and non-food
aspects of Diet & Health. Many projects will involve interdisciplinary
research, collaboration between institutions within and outside the
partnership, and international collaboration.
Jerry
Porter Senior VP, R&D, Procter & Gamble, said: “We are very excited to
secure this BBSRC Collaborative training partnership on Bioscience for
Sustainable Consumer Products. We see this as a unique opportunity to train a
new generation of bioscientists and grow the skills needed to fuel the UK
economy in the future. We look forward to seeing what creative new solutions
and ideas this partnership will open up to help address some of the fundamental
challenges we face as a company and a society on how to decarbonise industry and
deliver on the race to Net Zero.
“This
programme builds on strong and long-lasting relationships between P&G,
Prozomix, Durham, Northumbria and Newcastle Universities. We expect this
partnership to help P&G develop new insights and solutions through collaboration
on cutting edge bioscience that will ultimately help accelerate our action on
climate change toward net zero greenhouse gas emissions across our operations
and supply chain by 2040.”
Sustainable
consumer products
The
CTP PhD studentships at Northumbria University will focus on developing novel
enzyme technology which will ultimately make everyday household cleaning
products more environmentally friendly.
An
enzyme is a biological substance that speeds up chemical reactions, such as breaking
down – or degrading – dirt on clothes or dishes. By studying what the
components of dirt on everyday items are and how best to break them down,
scientists will look to discover, develop and characterize enzymes that can be
produced at large scale. These enzymes will then be tested as ingredients in
consumer cleaning products to see whether they perform as well as existing chemical
products.
The
hope is that these novel enzyme technologies will enable the development of more
environmentally friendly cleaning products, that allow us to wash at lower
temperatures and for less time, therefore cutting down on heating and water.
In
total, there will be 225 studentships as part of the new BBSRC CTPs, in
partnership with academia and industry, spanning 29 businesses and 12 academic
research organisations. The four-year studentships will be delivered over the
period 2022 to 2028 with £22.5 million of funding from BBSRC, and more than £14
million cash and in-kind co-investment from industry partners.
BBSRC
executive chair, Professor Melanie Welham said: “With the awards we have
announced BBSRC underlines its commitment to work with industry to support the
next generation of bioscience researchers. Projects will span areas vital to
our strategic priorities, such as tackling infections and helping to meet our
net zero goals.”
This
programme is a further example of Northumbria University’s commitment to a more
sustainable future. Having ranked 50th globally for
sustainability earlier this year, Northumbria is recognised as one of the global leaders for
sustainability in Times Higher Education’s Impact rankings for the contribution
it makes to the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals. The rankings
recognise how universities operate and how their research and partnerships are
delivering social, environmental, and economic benefits regionally, nationally
and internationally.
